An Evening in Gatwick: Airports, Pod Hotels, and Accidental StillnessAn Evening in Gatwick

In Transit, Slightly Lost, and Mildly Inspired

I was heading to Tobago to be best man at a wedding. The plan seemed simple—fly from Barcelona, change at Gatwick, then straight on. But travel rarely sticks to the plan, and I found myself with an unplanned overnight layover in South Terminal.

The groom, Andy, suggested the Yotel—one of those compact “pod” hotels you rent by the hour. Functional, ergonomic, and slightly space-age. Think padded walls and purple lighting. You half expect to wake up in low Earth orbit.

Before I could check in, I had time to kill. My grand plan? Find a bar, pour a glass of wine, and finally start writing the best man speech. But Gatwick had other ideas. Everything shut down at 9 p.m., leaving me adrift in a fluorescent ghost town.

Gatwick at Night: Like a Sci-Fi Film, But With Sandwiches

Wandering around Gatwick airport at night is surreal. It’s all lit up, functioning, clean—but people? Not so much. You get the sense of a place designed for endless movement, temporarily abandoned by its purpose. I rode the shuttle train back and forth between terminals, aimlessly, like a bored astronaut exploring different decks of a ship.

With nothing else to do, I took some photos using my compact camera and iPhone. I wasn’t aiming for brilliance—just capturing what was there. Looking back, there’s a mood to those images I recognize. It’s the atmosphere of a place built for chaos and energy, suddenly quiet. A place waiting for the next wave of stories to pass through.

The Yotel was fine. Quiet, clean, strange. Like sleeping inside a well-designed suitcase. But the images and the feeling of the night stayed with me. There’s something hauntingly beautiful about being alone in places meant for the rush of people in transit—everyone either going somewhere or finally arriving. When you’re stuck in between, the stillness says a lot.